


Up and out

by Disembo



Category: Moana - Fandom
Genre: Gen, Hopeful Ending, angst with humour, just two fighty bois who deep down really miss being friends, lalotai, possibly redeveloping friendship, some fights and a lot of bickering, trigger warning for a little bit of suicidal ideation, unsure crab awkwardly tries to be helpful
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-04
Updated: 2019-08-04
Packaged: 2020-07-30 21:53:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,237
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20104186
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Disembo/pseuds/Disembo
Summary: When Maui abandons Moana in the fight with Te Kā, he cleverly goes to Lalotai to start another one with Tamatoa.





	Up and out

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be funny, I don't know what happened.
> 
> Around two years ago, I got my first fic idea for Moana, and it was a silly story about Maui and Tamatoa bickering while Maui tries to help Tamatoa up. This was what I came up with instead, I guess as a little precursor.

Maui liked to think he had an answer for everything. So when he found himself standing in the sand surrounded by rocky Lalotai flora, bits of gold scattered at his feet, and Tamatoa inexplicably lying upside-down on his back, he found himself not liking it at all when – adding to the many things he already did not have an answer for – the crab also had to ask him why he was there.

"What happened to you?" he blurted for a reply, which made Tamatoa sputter so much that he rocked back and forth on his gilded shell.

"You didn't see it?" said the crab, incredulous.

"See what?"

"_See what!_" The crab was aghast. "See _me! You_ did this. _You_ happened. You and your little human when you bravely ran away – _happened_. What happened to your little human, little Mau-_eee!_"

Maui lowered his hook. "That's none of your business."

Tamatoa scoffed and stopped trying to shrink backwards into his shell. "Excuse me but I think it's absolutely my business," he retorted, pressing his claws to his chest. "She lured me upside-down with the Heart, and _you_ lured her to me as bait. Oh, don't think I don't know your game," he said when Maui started to scoff in turn. "What did you do, tell her I wasn't in?" With one eye fixed on the demigod, he twitched the other to glance around the clearing. "So, where is she now? Finally got tired of you?"

Now Maui started to scowl. "Shut up."

"Dead, then?"

He must have flinched because something changed in Tamatoa's face. Then the crab jeered, showing a great many vicious-looking teeth.

"You have nowhere to go," he said, giddy with glee. He jabbed a hairy claw at Maui. "_That's_ why you're here!"

Maui pasted on a grin to rival Tamatoa's, refusing to look the least bit upset. Just to sell it, he squared himself, too, and jutted out his chin. "I came here to fight, actually."

"Oh, did you, now?" drawled Tamatoa before trying (_"hup!"_) – and failing (_"oof!"_) – to roll back onto his front. He cleared his throat. "Are you, um, going to help me up first? At least?"

When Maui did not reply, the crab grimaced before hastily making a show of rolling his eyes. "_Augh._ Be that way!" He shrugged and shifted, deliberately slow and lazy. "Go on, then. You with your powers and me on my back. I'd say we're almost evenly matched-"

A giant claw snapped out at Maui, but he was ready. Swinging out of the way, the demigod darted and shifted through a whirlwind of bedazzled limbs and glittering treasures while the crab growled in frustration.

"Will you please stay still so I can catch you? It's…not easy…to spot you…from…this…angle!"

Something knocked into his hook and Maui's heart lurched. Sickly violet light surged up his arms, crackling and flickering. A few short manoeuvres later, another claw missed him by a hair and he very quickly realised what a bad move this whole thing was. He did not know just what that hit from Te Kā had done.

Tamatoa lashed out a leg, catching Maui off-guard. Stumbling and scrambling, he scuttled over it as a bug and transformed again before the crab could crush him into the dusty floor.

"Aw, poor Maui," cackled Tamatoa as the demigod staggered, crunching his toes on one of the crab's larger trinkets. "Did I trip you?"

_Enough games,_ Maui decided. Sidestepping another thrashing limb, he launched himself up over the crab, changing midair into a hawk, and Tamatoa squealed, scrabbled and flailed.

_WHAM!_

The flashing Lalotai landscape blinked out to blackness before fading back in, stunningly bright and even more garish than before.

"Oh," said Tamatoa. "Oops."

Groaning, Maui tried to sit up. Then he tried again. He struggled, alarm rising as he flopped against the ground, over and again, muscles like jelly and unable to breathe. The rumble of Tamatoa's gloat echoed somewhere up above, and Maui realised to his horror that he had – completely without meaning to – become a fish.

The demigod changed back, dodging another blow just in time. He brandished his buzzing hook, which was slowly beginning to whine. This was not good.

"Clum-_sy!_" sang the crab. "Is that how you lost them, Maui, man? You're here with no Heart and no human. I can guess where you went. And I can guess that you failed."

He shouldn't be here. Maui fought the noise that clouded his head. This was not good, this was wrong, it was all wrong, this fight was wrong, his hook was wrong, _he_ was. All. Wrong. Sand clung, scratching, to his skin. Hair was in his eyes – his hair – sticking to his sweat – running down his back – when had it come loose? He blocked and he ducked, the powers in his hook erratic, and he knew it wouldn't hold up. He knew he couldn't keep up.

Tamatoa's voice echoed through the shouts and clashes. "You know," it boomed, "for someone who likes humans so much, you're _incredibly_ careless as to what happens to them."

_Careless._

A brilliant shower of sparks burst across the hook where the crab scraped it with his claw, filling Maui's vision. The demigod went cold.

For a fraction of a second, he went deaf and he went blind.

Then he saw that laugh on Moana's face. A look of joy she would never wear again. He saw the stars he taught her to measure – stars she would never see again. She would never again splash in the Ocean, or challenge him at fishing, or fuss over that hopeless, hopeless chicken she cared so much about, not if she went ahead without him, which he knew – _of course_ – she would, because what else was she going to do?

_Careless._

And he saw Te Fiti, burnt and barren. He'd taken it all from her – her bold and beautiful colours, the tart scent of fruit and flowers, the calls, the songs, the chatters, from the breeze that bloomed in her warmth to the shade that striped her sun-soaked sand. All the love she'd had for her creatures, all she'd shared to make up what he and countless more others called home, all gone, all because of him.

He had done this. He had _happened_.

He didn't know how his hook ended up at Tamatoa's eye, but there it was, neatly curved around the outstretched eyestalk, with his fists at the other end clenched too tightly, painfully tightly. There was a ringing in his ears. An urgent tugging at his shoulder, where his tattoo was moving. He ignored it. When he spoke, his voice came out through his teeth and it was the ugliest sound he had ever heard.

_Carelesscarelesscare-_

"You don't know what you're talking about," he spat, anger swelling each word until they jostled to be the first out of him. "You don't know ANYTHING and you don't get to say anything about mortals or me, or anything at all. Ever again. Except to tell me why I shouldn't take your eye this time."

A hush.

There was an unbearable, almost audible stillness. The air itself was holding its breath. Then, like a distant cloud darkening all too swiftly into an ocean storm, a growing horror turned Maui's stomach as it dawned on him exactly what he'd just said. His mouth twisted with the taste of it. His skin crawled and he hated it, hated the way he sounded – hated himself. Here he was: a hero who hurt more than he helped. He tried to think of a way to change the subject, to excuse himself or take it all back – couldn't he do _anything_ right? – but when he looked up, dreading Tamatoa's reaction, he saw that the crab was blinking rapidly, his attention… elsewhere.

"Maui…" he said uneasily.

And suddenly the demigod was terrified.

"What happened to your hook?"

Maui was all at once aware of the knot in his gut, of the rasping in his breath. It scratched his throat. And he couldn't seem to keep his arms steady – the fractured fishhook wobbled dangerously.

"Don't ask me that," he begged. "_Don't._"

But he could not stop Tamatoa tracing the edge of the weapon with his gaze, or moving his free eye closer to the cracks. "Burns," the crab mused, and Maui had to bite back a whimper. "And little bits of shiny… Is this – obsidian? Oh, _Maui._" He looked up, his expression pained. "_Why_ did you have to go back?"

Maui clenched and unclenched his jaw, unsure if he wanted to answer. Then he heard himself whisper, "It was spreading."

Tamatoa's face was blank. "_What_ was spreading?"

"The darkness," stammered Maui, "the…"

"_What_ darkness-"

"There was a curse!" Maui said, much louder than he had intended. "When I- when I took the Heart."

Seeing Tamatoa open his mouth, Maui forged on before he could interrupt again. "Whatever summoned Te Kā, it didn't stop there. It's infected the ocean. Islands are dying. Fish are leaving."

Tamatoa gasped. "Fish!"

"We were trying to get to Te Fiti. We were going to fix it. But Te Kā – she was in the way."

"_Oh-_" The crab made a noise that sounded oddly sympathetic. Then he pursed his lips. "And your friend?"

It took a moment for Maui to realise he meant Moana. He started to shift from foot to foot. "She won't stand a chance."

This time, Tamatoa said nothing. And in the heavy silence that followed, Maui had never felt more alone.

He heard the blood beat in his ears.

"I left."

And the wave of guilt hit him and he choked on his own words. Useless. No, but he had to do it. He couldn't help her. Gods help him, he was drowning, his salt-coated throat on fire, every breath laced with fluid, fighting the urge to double over and sink to the ocean floor. No, get a grip, get a grip. He squeezed his eyes shut. What was wrong with him? No, he would help himself. He would- he would- Why couldn't she have stopped when he'd said? But that wasn't the problem right now. She hadn't asked him to come here. She hadn't asked for any of this. Now that was done and now it was too late, too difficult, too dangerous and he didn't know how to fix it because now, his hook- now, Moana- now, the curse-

It hurt. Somewhere in his chest, it hurt and he couldn't think, and it felt as though he would burst if he did not let it out, let his legs give out and roar loud and raw enough to scare himself, enough to fill his ears and exhaust his lungs and hollow out his heart. He wished he would crumble, piece by pathetic piece, until every last speck of him was lost to the cold and bitter wind, until he felt nothing more – _was_ nothing more. Oh, what had he done? He did not care. He did not care at all.

Maui barely heard Tamatoa speak, trying hard as he was to hold on to himself. He did not dare breathe nor move.

"Um… Maui, man," the crab had said. Maui opened his eyes. He still couldn't see a thing – it was all very blurry.

"I don't know what you've got going on up there," ventured Tamatoa, surprisingly gently, "though I get that it's a lot, don't get me wrong, but…are we going to do this all day?"

"…Huh?" Maui's head started to hurt as well.

"I mean, we can, if you want." Tamatoa shrugged delicately. "You're the one with the hook. But I'm getting a little bit of a cramp, you know? In my eye? So I thought we could maybe switch to the other one for a while. If you don't mind."

A wild urge to laugh took hold of Maui. Wow. He was going mad. How had it come to this? He glanced at his hook, at Tamatoa's eye, and winced. "No, I… I don't…" He shook his head, blinking away the haze. "I can't be here. I need to think."

Carefully, he loosened the hook, stepping back from Tamatoa. A long-suffering sigh rattled from the crab. Then, with an almighty heave, he spun on his shell, swept Maui off the sand, and caught him between his pincers.

"Ha-_ha!_" he crowed.

"_No!_" Maui bellowed. His heart dropped to his stomach while he watched his hook clatter to the ground. Panic seized him by the throat and he grappled fruitlessly with the claw. _Stupid, stupid!_ He was fighting a monster – an unpredictable, power-crazed creature who had a grudge against him. How had he forgotten that?

The crab brought him up to his face, close enough that Maui could see the bumps that made up his skin. His humid breath enveloped the demigod as he spoke.

"Do you- Do you know-" the crab began, and then he paused, eyestalks wobbling. "Maui. Maui, man. Stop that kicking, come on, how's that going to help?"

Maui made one last effort to prise apart the pincers at his ribs, which only made the crab squeeze harder, until he gasped for air and gave up, letting his head loll against the shell. As Tamatoa relaxed his grip in response – still not enough for an escape – it occurred to Maui that he really had no business being alive. He had been alive for several lifetimes, blessed with gifts beyond anything anyone could wish for, and had nothing to show for it. If he'd only been allowed to grow up as a normal boy – if the gods had not found him – if they had not saved him – Oh, what difference did it make? He'd thrown it all away, chasing after mortals, trying to prove to himself that they had been wrong, that he was wanted, that he did matter – still, he never truly believed it. Why did he do that? Why was he like this? He never learned. And now he never would, because it was all over.

The crab had won.

Tamatoa's eyes spun. "_Wha-?_"

In a way, he felt relieved. The crab was right. There was no more help for him. There was no more pretending to be brave, or pretending to be strong. He was tired of it.

"Do one thing for me?" he said quietly. "Can you skip the gloating, just this once? Or leave it until… after?" He steeled himself when his voice gave out, forcing himself to look at the crab. "After you eat me," he clarified.

"_Eat_ you?" Tamatoa spluttered and recoiled. "_Now?_"

Somewhere in the numbness of it all, it occurred to him that this would not go painless or easy, or anything like he could hope it would. Then again, almost nothing ever did.

The crab hesitated. "Do you…_want_ me to?"

Maui tried to think about it. But he did not know. He tried to go with what he felt was best, but he had forgotten what that felt like. The ache in his chest had dulled, so there was that. Though it wasn't gone. It was all he felt, in fact.

"I'm dead either way," he replied at last, with a finality that should have scared him. "Can you get on with it?"

"And _why would I?_" Tamatoa jolted him with a shake. "Presumptuous, much? Just because I tried to eat you last time doesn't mean I'm going to do it every time I catch you. And you're no fun like this! What am I supposed to tell the other monsters?"

The crab ranted on, wildly waving his claws (and Maui) in the air, and the demigod took the time to rest from thinking for a while. Taunts didn't matter to him now; he had no more ego to bruise. Then he started noticing how uncomfortable it was to be shaken about like this. Then he wanted Tamatoa to stop.

"So you're…_not_ going to eat me?" he said, interrupting the crab, who had now moved on to the subject of fish.

"_No!_ And don't ask me again or I promise I never will!"

Maui felt a flash of annoyance. Of course. Just his kind of luck. "Then let me go."

"Oh, you make it sound so simple. Where would you go if I did?"

Where _would_ he go?

He'd been away for a thousand years. The people he used to know were long gone. He belonged nowhere now.

"Back," he blurted before he realised what he'd said.

Tamatoa wiggled his antennae. "Back where?"

To the island. To his own banishment. Where he would see, face and live with no one but himself for all the rest of time. It was more than he deserved.

"To Te Fiti," he said. "To try again. Moana, that girl with me… she's tough. Smart. She could still be there, when I get there. We could figure something out."

The crab's eyes narrowed. "You don't believe that."

"What do you _want?_" Maui exclaimed, losing his patience. "You're just going to lie here and shake me until you talk me to death?"

"No…!" said Tamatoa, somewhat defensively. "I'm going to lie here and shake you and… talk. Until I know you're not going to do something we're all going to regret."

At first, Maui did not know what he meant. Then he understood, and heat crept up the lines on his glowering face. "I don't need you to help me."

"Oh! You don't? I didn't ask, but that's good to know, that's _very good!_" Tamatoa's voice was high and gratingly chipper. "Maui's got it all together! Look at Super Maui, jumping down into Lalotai. Starting fights and then immediately losing. Making me think he's got a death wish when it's really all part of Clever Maui's clever plan, oh, you trickster, you!" He tilted an eyestalk, curious. "Why _did_ you come down here?"

Maui leaned in as close to the eye as he could.

"Kill me," he said, and watched the crab's face change from smug to puzzled to alarmed. "Or let me go. I am _not_ doing this with you."

Tamatoa shifted. "C'mon, man…"

Maui slammed his palms on Tamatoa's claw. "_Stop_," he said, anguish cracking his voice. "You can't fix this by talking at me. Do you think it's that simple? I messed up, _bad_, and every minute I'm here it's getting worse. I can't stop it. I wish I could tell you different, but you're wasting your time. Don't you get it? _I've already failed!_"

Tamatoa's eyes were wide. Maui took a breath and kicked his dangling feet. His back was getting sore. He wished Tamatoa would put him down.

"I'm not a hero," he finally sighed. "Not anymore. I'm sorry."

Amazingly, the apology only seemed to irk Tamatoa. He flopped his arms to the ground, making an exasperated noise, and Maui forgot his dilemma for just a little while because his world had quite literally flipped upside-down.

"I'm not sure if you have this figured out," said the crab as Maui yelped, "but eating you won't get me back right-side-up."

Just as suddenly, he tossed Maui through the air into his other claw, and the demigod found himself facing up again, dizzy from all the turns.

"Eating you means even if I do manage to get up, I'm going to slowly starve to death once we all run out of fish because of that curse _you-_"

"_Hurrh!_" said Maui in response to a jab in the solar plexus.

"-unleashed. What, you didn't think I noticed?" (Maui was thinking that he was going to be sick.) "I used to get plenty of fish. Good fish. Now it's just passable fish, and that's not enough! Do you know how long it's been since my last moult? Do you know how many I need to grow back my leg? Do you know how tricky it is to hunt and dance like this? Do you?"

Tamatoa eyed Maui pointedly, and Maui, stunned, realised that he fully expected an answer.

"Uh, v-very," he stuttered. "Many! Many. Very many?"

"Close enough. I can't expect you to be precise; you're not a crab."

Tamatoa drifted off, murmuring something about his love for dance before going quiet. After a minute, he looked back to Maui. "What were we talking about?"

"Uhhh, you were going to let me go."

"Oh right, I was…" The crab faltered and scowled. He squinted an eye at Maui. "You think you're so clever."

It had been worth a shot.

"Well, guess what, mini-god," Tamatoa hissed. "Of course, I'm letting you go! Okay? I don't _want_ you here! I've got a lot going on, my own stuff to deal with, and I don't have time for a fight. Or whatever this is. So you don't get to come and waste my energy to distract you from _your_ problems. Those are up to you. _I_ can't help you. Not by eating you, anyway. And obviously I'm no good at helping any other way because I don't know how, and what makes you think I owe you any favours? You owe _me!_"

"What!" Maui squeaked.

"I found your hook."

"That doesn't-"

"_That doesn't nyeneneh,_" babbled Tamatoa. "I get it! You're not going to listen to me. And I don't blame you. I don't exactly tend to have your best interests at heart. But you already have that silly little cartoon on your chest, and here I am, trying my best-"

"Hold up – _What_ did you call Mini-Maui?"

"What? Silly? And little? You can't say I'm wrong there, you named it _Mini-Maui! Aww!_ What's wrong is it's definitely smarter than you."

Maui spluttered. "Was that an insult!"

"Ooh. I don't know. Maybe if you'd ask your cartoon-"

"You just- Don't call him that!"

"But it _is_ a cart-"

Maui swung his leg and managed to kick the pincer holding him, which he immediately regretted because it hurt him a lot more than it did Tamatoa.

"Wow, okay. Honestly, I don't know why you're mad. You're pretty cartoony yourself."

"Stop using that word! I am not a- a-"

Tamatoa brought him down scarily close to his barnacled teeth.

"Whoa!" Maui promptly resumed his struggling.

"How about you stop clowning around and then I'll stop, how about that?"

"Okay! Don't-"

"_You_ fly down here trying to pick a fight and what am I supposed to do? I had to get you before you got me, it's basic self-defense, but now I see you're not even trying."

"What do y-"

"_What,_" continued Tamatoa in a voice full of emotion, "_what_ even was that- that _horrible_ thing with my eye?"

"What thi… _oh._ Ah." Maui stopped kicking and cringed. "Sorry about that, bud-"

"Oh ho ho, _sorry about that, bud!_ We are not friends! How- What- Did…" Tamatoa's gaze clouded over and he went very still. Then, with a mix of utter bewilderment and incredulity, he squawked, "Did you just say you were _sorry?_"

"Uh. Yeah?"

"Oh."

Now Tamatoa made a face. A strange, twitchy face that had Maui suddenly wondering if crabs like him could sneeze.

"Okay," said Tamatoa. "I'm a little thrown off here. Because I was going to make you feel bad, you know? And now I can't."

"That's not how… You can still, uh…"

The crab tilted his head, face crinkling up in non-understanding, and Maui decided not to further sabotage himself by explaining.

"For what it's worth, I do feel bad. I mean it. I shouldn't have said that. The eye thing, I mean."

"No, no," said the crab magnanimously, "don't apologise. I'm not even going to be mad over a clumsy threat like that." He paused. "Okay, I _am_ mad. But I'm still not going to eat you. Know why?"

"Look," pleaded Maui. "I get that you're not. You don't ha-"

"No need to answer! I'll tell you why." Tamatoa adjusted his grip and the demigod braced himself for another wildly-gesticulated rant.

"I was saying – sit up, man – I mean, I know you can't sit, but you know what I- D'you know what your problem is, Maui, man?"

Maui rubbed a hand over his face. "You say that like I have just one."

"I mean your biggest one. Your most important one."

"Is it you?"

And with that, Maui got shock of his life when the crab's face lit up in a jagged smile.

"It's nice to hear I'm the most important," said Tamatoa, absolutely delighted.

"Uh-"

"But we all know that." Tamatoa waved his free claw. "No, you never listen, _that's_ your problem. Okay, you listen to me sometimes – but that's not the point! My point is I'll bet your hook that little… tattoo on your chest has been berating you, all day. But here you are. You know what to do. You just don't listen! It's- it's stupid! If I'd said to myself- if I'd said, 'Hmm. I need to go get some treasure so I can be shiny,' but then _I didn't listen_, what then? Where would I be?"

"Probably not on your back," Maui muttered, and Tamatoa gasped like he had never been so insulted in his life.

"Can you _not?_" he said snippily. "If you're going to be upset, that's okay! If you say you're not a hero, yeah, whatever. There's no need for you to be _anything!_ I'm only asking you to _do_ things. Because right now you're not doing anything, and it's eating you – it's eating you up inside – you don't need me to do it!"

Tamatoa heaved a heavy sigh. And when he spoke again, Maui realised he sounded different. Tired. A little uncomfortable. And very, very careful.

"This is as difficult for me as it is for you. Don't make it harder than it has to be." The crab looked him in the eyes as best he could. "You think just because I want to, I'm just going to kill you. Yeah, I get it, that's totally something I'd do. Though that's not going to help me at all, is it? And it's not going to help you."

Maui caught his reflection, battered and – he shuddered – painfully vulnerable, in the crab's mismatched pupils. He nearly looked away. But the eyes themselves held no judgement nor cruelty, not this time. Only a complete earnestness so overwhelming, it did not matter what the crab said next because, for one fleeting moment, Maui was back in another time, in a very similar place, with someone he'd gotten along much better with – long, long before mistakes made, wrongs done and actions deemed unforgivable. A someone he'd thought he would never meet again. Watching Tamatoa pick through his fallen treasures on the ground, a strange, sad longing burned in his heart for things he could never have back, and it came out as a tremor in his voice.

"What if I'm too late?"

_Why are you helping me?_ was what he really wanted to ask.

"I don't want to mess this up again," he said instead.

Tamatoa stopped his scraping and looked at Maui. Stared, actually, until the demigod started to squirm.

"What are you-"

"You're not comfortable," said Tamatoa suddenly. He sounded surprised. "Here, let me…" And to Maui's own surprise, the crab loosened his grip, using his other claw to help him into a sitting position.

Perched at the edge of a pincer, Maui gingerly massaged his ribs and glanced up to offer a word of thanks, which was when he found out that Tamatoa had moved him right up next to his face.

"_Gah!_"

"Listen," rambled the crab while Maui tried desperately to regain his balance. "You don't have to go back if you don't want to. Not even because I asked. It's a lot, up there – and it's _a lot_ to ask. The world will take care of itself, one way or another. You have to look out for you. Stay here, if you want. Or go – wherever you want. It's okay. We could- we could have another fight. If that's what you feel like. At least until you're ready to try something else."

Maui clung to the pincer, still trying not to fall off. "Uh. I. Uh. Th-th-thanks?"

What was he supposed to say to _that?_

"But I'm not- it's not- that's not what I meant. You're forgetting Moana. She's just a human. And I left her up there all by herself."

"Oh."

Tamatoa _hmm_-ed awkwardly and tapped his massive chin. "Okay, well… You were right, you know."

Maui clambered up to a more secure spot on the claw. "What do you mean?"

"You said your human friend was smart. And you were right. Technically, she beat me." And the crab gestured to his upside-down self, wiggling his legs in the air. "How did you find her?"

"She found me."

"Oh, my condolences to her."

"She was _looking_ for me!"

_("Why would she do that?")_ Maui was pretty sure he heard Tamatoa say under his breath before loudly exclaiming, "Oh, so she's smart _and_ lucky!"

Maui snorted. "You don't have to try that hard."

"Okay, I won't. So while I can't say _you_ won't mess things up again, I can say it much more confidently for her!"

"Wow!" Oh, that stung. Though he did tell him- no, but he didn't have to say _that!_

"Ha, thanks, that's really reassuring," said Maui, not quite managing to keep the hurt from his voice. He would have walked away, if he could only have stood up without falling over. "Why do you even bother helping me?"

"Because I want to," said Tamatoa, suddenly serious. He poked Maui in the chest. "What do _you_ want to do?"

For the longest time, they said nothing while Maui looked at his hands, the ground, the sea. A short way behind him, he heard the deep gurgle of a geyser grow into a roar. He knew. Somewhere in his heart of hearts, he had the answer all along. And it scared him to face it for what it was.

Slowly, Tamatoa lowered his arms, dragging his free claw along the sand.

"Maui, man, I wish I could," he murmured, "but I can't tell you it'll be alright this time. I know that's what you want to hear: you'll know what to do, you won't mess it up, you've got it now. But how would I know?"

Maui slumped. He understood. Still, he couldn't help feeling like something had sunk within him. Then he gasped, sitting up as the crab went on to say, "I can't tell you how things will go, if you go up there, but…"

Tamatoa had picked up a treasure. But not just any treasure…

"I can tell you, if you do go back…"

The crab held the fishhook out to the demigod.

"You won't be by yourself, up there."

-:-

A short while later, Tamatoa lay in the sand, feeling pretty good about himself up until the moment he realised that he was still stuck on his back, having completely forgotten to get Maui to help him up.

"_Augh!_"

It was too late now. Maui was out of Lalotai, flying back to his clever human, ready to pick up the fight against Te Kā. But it was fine. Nothing to worry about. It was going to be fine.

"Maui, man, you _better_ be fine. I swear if you die up there I am so going to kill you."

**Author's Note:**

> This took forever and was super hard to do. I do plan to write the original funny idea I had in the next chapter. Might take a while though.
> 
> **Important note:** I hope it's understood that as much as Tamatoa tries to help out here, he is still Tamatoa, and someone like the Tamatoa in this story is very likely not the best person to turn to when you're going through some heavy stuff. The world is full of many others who will try their best to be there for you when things are difficult. I've been through times when I felt there was no point in anything, and I was lucky that I had some understanding people to turn to. And even though they did not necessarily know the best way to help me out, even though they could not actually do anything to make things better, I can't imagine how things would be without them. Please if things aren't going well for you right now, please hang in there, don't blame yourself, and treat yourself as kindly as you can. We all experience pain differently, for different reasons, and they are all valid. And though I can't possibly understand completely what the world is like for anybody else, I really think there's a lot to like in sticking around.


End file.
